ambassador, thank you for joining us today. >> thank you for having me. we're talking about the prime minister, the prime minister assuring president obama according from what we're hearing from u.s. officials, there would not be a full-scale ground assault into gaza unless hamas escalated its moves into southern israel. meaning the rocket attacks. we heard an israeli defense force spokeswoman who said we are currently training and preparing for ground possibilities. which one is it? >> well first of all, military, generally speaking will always, this is their job, and i say this as someone who served in the military, you always have to have a contingency plan. so the fact that for 75 people, 75,000 israeli reservists were authorized to be recruited by the idf. it doesn't mean that the idf is going to use them tomorrow. regarding your first question, the israeli cabinet, the commander-in-chief, gave the israeli defense forces a clear mandate, to remove the threat that we view to be of strategic nature. to remove the threat of rockets and missiles coming i